 | Poems |  |
70
ART AND NATURE.
In the clear day-spring of my youth,When life's winged pageants smiled like truth,
Oft did I tread the regal hall,
Gorgeous with midnight festival,
Where coloured lamps shed softly round
Their fitful splendours, and the sound
Of thrilling instruments was heard,
Softened to suit the whispered word.
—But were those glad scenes dear to me?
Was my heart filled with melody?
Were my thoughts bathed in rosy light?
Could they even charm my wayward sight?
—Oh, none can ever dream or know
All then I felt of fevered wo!
Nor what a gracious sweet relief
(As to a mother's yearning grief
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And on her beating bosom cast),
It was to me to quit those halls
And those illumined festivals,
And pass from all the pomps of art
Into the fresh air of the heart—
Into my thought's proud solitude,
The chainless mind's infinitude!—
The bright, bright silence of my dreams,
That world of sounds, and hues, and gleams!
To nature's keyless sanctuaries,
The breezy hills, the breathless skies,
Rejoining with sweet raptures keen
Old memories garnered in each scene.
Thus, though I sorrowed bitterly,
High blessings were reserved for me,
A costly recompense was mine
In those past days, ere Hope's decline
Impoverished mine imaginings,
And chained my fancy's rainbowed wings.
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Rushed like a freed bird to the sky,
Out-thrilled the skylark's ringing lays,
With music of its joy and praise—
With its deep fervid passionate tones,
Its inborn mighty unisons.
Oft the heart's melodies are deep,
For the heart's arteries bleed and weep,
Each languishing and lengthening tone,
Till ev'ry breath is sorrow's own!
But in that spring-burst of my youth,
I deemed my veriest fancies truth;
And O'twas joy beyond all joys,
Such as ne'er ends, nor tires, nor cloys,
To pass from all the pomps of art
Into the fresh air of the heart!
To nature's sweet unmasked revealings,
The fresh air of the unbounded feelings!
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